


Work Songs

by crookedqueen



Category: The 100 (TV)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-08-09
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-04-13 21:24:35
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 8,616
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4537917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/crookedqueen/pseuds/crookedqueen
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The story ends like this: Midnight, an old cicada song and a Slim Jim between Clarke’s teeth, lips bruised from a lot more than just kissing, the cold underneath a pickup’s backside, bent metal and bloodied fingertips, the faraway cry of teenagers in the dark, a white lace dress with dirt on the hem, and Bellamy’s leather jacket – smoke, book pages, and peach juice. || <b>Bellamy and Clarke fall in love on a peach orchard. Heaven and hellfire commence.</b></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Forty Acres and the Boy You Don't Love

**Author's Note:**

> playlist: http://8tracks.com/crooked-queen/work-songs

> _“And I was burning up a fever – I didn’t care much how long I lived._
> 
> _But I swear, I thought I dreamed her. She never asked me once about the wrong I did.”_

 

**_The story ends like this:_ **

Midnight, an old cicada song and a Slim Jim between Clarke’s teeth, lips bruised from a lot more than just kissing, the cold underneath a pickup’s backside, bent metal and bloodied fingertips, the faraway cry of teenagers in the dark, a white lace dress with dirt on the hem, Bellamy’s leather jacket – _smoke, book pages, and peach juice_ , the dull glow and hum of a quick mart that has no business being open this late, and the one person standing in line: a boy with more hair in his eyes than hope, a grim expression, a paperback in his back pocket, and as many freckles on his face as there are stains on his white t-shirt.

Bellamy glances up at her through the window, how she’s crossing and uncrossing her legs as they swing from the back of his truck outside. He raises a brow, half-interested. Stray blonde curls stick _heavy_ to the back of her neck from the humidity. Clarke swats them away and still, after all this time, she’s a little bit furious at Bellamy for existing, a little bit embarrassed too.

He smirks.

The radio quivers to life with the static-y script of an old variety show, so vintage Clarke reaches over to thump it with her palm, wondering if _time_ broke somehow. Being around Bellamy has always felt that way, a tightrope timeline, those ember and ash features of his, shooting her glances and whispering thoughts that are decades behind. Bellamy is getting on your knees for a hero’s god. Bellamy is gold and rust and the beginning of the world.

Inside, the cashier tells a bad joke.

Bellamy sighs while he chuckles.

 _“You love him, Susie, you do!”_ The radio breaks and booms. _“He’s in your head and under your skin like one of those magazines you want to keep on reading. You love him like you love the moon, Sue, and that’s the worst kind of love. All it’s got to do is wake up.”_

Suddenly, Bellamy’s standing before her, proffering a root beer and one thousand dollars, cash. He shrugs one shoulder, splays his fingers out so that his thumbs are tickling the outside of her gooseflesh thighs.

“I know you’re not used to such fine dining, princess,” Bellamy smirks. “Champagne.” He hands her a lukewarm beer bottle. “Caviar.” An old bag of Goldfish drops onto her lap.

Clarke shakes her head, smiles. “Funny.”

“One of us has to have a sense of humor,” Bellamy says, searching her eyes. He’s so close to her that if either of them breathes, it’ll be a kiss. Watching her, he slaps the side of the truck twice and pushes off, jerks his head for her to get inside.

In the truck, Bellamy doesn’t cup her thigh or play with her hair. She kicks her feet up onto the dashboard, and he glances over at her. Their elbows brush, both of them in the passenger seat. Clarke narrows her eyes and inhales, thinks of the last line of a poem that’s not her favorite.

_When did a boy become the devil?_

Clarke rolls her shoulders back, tries to get comfortable, and Bellamy seems to be amused by this. They pull up beside an old ghost farm, where the sunflowers tangle to whisper, _there are no miracles here_. She purses her lips, and he clenches his jaw like they’re going into a picket fence war.

When they stop at a light, Clarke glances back at her packed bags; Bellamy’s face glows red, yellow, green.

_When did the devil make a friend?_

**: one year earlier :**  

 

> “You’ve ruined peaches for me.
> 
> I can’t eat one without thinking of your hands
> 
> dipping into my soft flesh, mouth dripping,
> 
> teeth skimming across skin, tongue lapping
> 
> at the excess:
> 
> greedy, greedy, greedy.
> 
> I am all rush and blush at a summer picnic lunch,
> 
> hands shaking at the farmer’s market.”
> 
> — 
> 
> | 
> 
> _“Peaches”, Trista Mateer_  
>   
> ---|---  
>   
>  
> 
>  

They tasted a lot like regret. The peaches, that is. The people did too, but there's just _something_ about sinking your teeth into what's so ripe and innocent – never did anything but _grow_ – that makes you feel like some sort of criminal. Sweet ruination, Bellamy thought to himself, wiping the peach dribble from his lips with the back of his hand. He stared down at it for a moment, juicy and dripping. _Oh well_. Guilt tasted damned good.

“You just got here, Bellamy,” came a voice from behind him before Marcus Kane plucked the fruit from his palm. “Give it a few days before you attempt to make my job impossible.”

Bellamy cocked his head to one side, smiled grimly. “And what fun would that be?”

“Alas,” Kane smiled, shutting the book in the boy’s other hand and holding it behind his back. “If only we were here to have fun. We’re here to pick _peaches_ , ladies and gentleman.” He replaced Bellamy’s novel with a pale pink baseball cap, a single ripe peach embroidered on the front of it, _Griffin Acres Peach Orchard_ across the back.

“In case you haven’t heard, my name is Marcus Kane, and I’ll be supervising your work this summer,” Kane announced to the small crowd of slumped teenagers clustered by a bent tree. One of them yawned. “Griffin Acres is one of the most prestigious orchards in the South. And whether it was that or your delinquency that brought you here – _welcome_. You’re quite the lucky bunch.”

Octavia perked up from behind Bellamy and raised a brow. “Half our pay is rotten peaches and these ugly hats.”

Bellamy hid a smile.

“Thank you, Octavia,” Kane smiled, swatting a fly from his face. “It’s a pleasure having the Blakes back with us this year. Especially as Bellamy has been promoted to my second this summer and will be managing from the _battlefront_.”

Bellamy raised his fist and did a bow for weak applause and some broken laughter.

“Exciting, yes,” Kane said. “Since you’re feeling so energetic, Bellamy, why don’t you take the reigns, give us a little demonstration, go over our ground rules.” The man leaned back against an old crate and gestured for Bellamy to take the stage.

Bellamy muttered an expletive under his breath, tiredly scanned the group of teens. This was why they called him _Pops_ every summer, much to Bellamy’s hostile dismay. He’d been working at the orchard since long before he’d become Octavia’s legal guardian, back when they were still living in a trailer run into the ground, raised by whichever piece of their mother she felt like showing that day: a bare leg, rolled back eyes, a cigarette burning the edge of a feather boa and cold alphabet soup stuck to the bowl, spelling _mom_ inside. Bellamy’s room had been nothing more than a box with Octavia’s bassinet inside of it, crooked stars and the shadows of gladiators and gods pasted to the lamp and ceiling. That seemed like a whole lifetime ago – before Kane took pity on the poor boy who’d been picking a peach a day for a few dollars and some daytime mischief when his mother skipped town – offered him and Octavia the little room above his garage on the outskirts of town, three hot meals a day and the occasional word of wisdom that earned an eyebrow raise from Bellamy and an eye roll from Octavia. They didn’t _talk_ about the favor Kane had done them – a rural scholar with a shit ton of ambition had no business taking in two trailer park kids who were as good as sticky glue to their Southern town.

(He called Bellamy _son_ once over soggy cereal in the morning then - after Bellamy’s features contorted - never again.)

But in truth, Bellamy had Kane to thank for a lot of what had grown inside of himself. Once upon a time, before the liquor came in and his mother became a tragedy of circumstance, she told him stories without endings – brave and gritty sagas, heroes and scars, battle cries and olive branches. When Bellamy mentioned them to Kane, the man only smiled in slight surprise, slight intrigue, led Bellamy into a side room of his dingy, one-story ranch house fit for a man with no inheritance but a lot of pride. Its inside held tons and tons of yellowed paperbacks, found history books, rare Bible editions, leather bound classics, pamphlets pasted together, and anthologies bound by figurative blood. Bellamy wasn’t impressed by a whole lot around Miston.

This? He was _awestruck_.

But years passed and heroes didn’t exist in their town; just sweet tea, dead grass, and venom.

Kane cleared his throat.

_And pains in the ass._

“Right.” Bellamy let out a pointed sigh and pushed off the crates behind him with one calloused hand. He led the dazed group of youth over to the first tree in their row. A few faces were familiar: good old sulking Murphy, ponytailed and biting Raven, snarky Miller, smart hooligans Jasper and Monty, and the other kids who’d latched onto him like glue over the years, whether any of them liked it or not.

“Find a tree, find a peach.” Bellamy reached up, turned one over. “Check for worms, check for rot.” He pulled the fruit down with a swivel. “Pick the peach, toss it into the crate. Rotten peach? Toss it into the waste.” Bellamy did as he said, crossed his arms at the small crowd. “Riveting stuff, I know. Look, the work is hard, but the breeze is easy. Our goal is to get these fresh and pretty, preserved and packaged in bulk by summer’s end. Half of you will be out on the fields everyday, half of you down in the workshop. Shifts switch every week, so that shouldn’t give you time to cry about it.” By an old oak, this local girl Echo who’d grown up near Bellamy at the park smirked, eyes glowing and set dead on him. He smiled a bit, then relaxed his features. “Rules are simple. No fooling around, eating half the peaches, flirting or etcetera. Unfortunately for all of us, you answer to me this summer.” Bellamy leaned forward, eyebrows raised. “And I _really_ don’t want to have any questions.”

Faint chuckles.

“And finally, stay away from the castle,” Bellamy said, gesturing over to the sprawling white house on the hill in the distance, a winding lily-brick road up to marble steps, dewed grass and white shuttered windows, where the Griffins themselves resided – _minus one_. Despite himself, Bellamy’s gaze was drawn to the open window on the upper left side of the house, blue curtains fluttering in the wind. He cupped his own jaw, lost in the Klimt painting curling up from the wall, a half-empty glass of sweet tea on the sill next to some paperbacks, paintbrushes drying and dripping over the pot of flowers hung below, coloring the chrysanthemums a puddle after a storm.

Bellamy flinched a bit, stared down at the grass.

“Other than that, do whatever the hell you want,” he gruffed. “Now let’s get to work.”

:::

Clarke Griffin was not a quitter.

Over time, it had become more of a mantra and less than the truth. Still, she whispered it under her breath and held onto her windowsill for dear life. Outside, the moon was stretching its arms and breathing pink into the sky. A firefly ball had just begun; peach trucks were rolling back into town after a long day of work, rattling the earth, and a suitcase still sat half unpacked on her prim white bed.

“Staying awhile?”

Clarke’s eyes snapped open, spun in her step to find Wells Jaha, resident golden boy and mayor’s son standing at her doorway smiling. She exhaled, took in what time had done to Wells – the set shoulders, the sharp jaw and bright eyes, everything about him screamed _presidential_. But all Clarke could focus on was Wells, the _boy_. The hesitation blanketing his soft tone, the flinch in his eyes, the half moon burn they shared on their bodies: Wells above his left brow, Clarke’s on her right thigh.

_“What is this, Wells? What did you do?”_

_Pillars falling, the world flaming, glass shattering like unwanted fireworks in the night._

_“Clarke – “_

_A burn. On the inside this time. “My dad.”_

Clarke exhaled through her nose again, blinked the memory away and rolled the white pleated skirt she wore over the scar. Jamais vu.

“Hey Wells,” Clarke finally said, curt and quiet. The cold storm that was Clarke Griffin delusioned a lot of people into mistaking her for timid, _afraid_. But her skeleton skin wasn’t trembling; it was smooth marble, it was stone. Clarke was guarded, pointed, calculating. Those who knew her well also knew that if time forgot Clarke Griffin, she would forget it right back.

Wells knew her well.

And still, he dared to scoop her up into a hug, ignoring her harsh tense upon feeling his embrace. Her hands hung at her side. In the mirror, an old picture from another time was tucked into the frame, a younger version of herself on the back of a younger Wells, dandelion petals stuck and skin glowing from playing all afternoon. Something unfamiliar on her features – happiness.

Clarke pried away from the boy.

“I said hello,” Clarke snapped, “not let’s let bygones be bygones.”

“Clarke, I’m sorry,” Wells said, his voice wounded. He glanced around her childhood bedroom. “I know that you blame me for that night, the fire out in the shed, your dad. But I’ve been hurting just like you. You’ve been gone so long.”

It had only been a year, but Wells was right. That was a _long_ time in a town like this, where the air was always holding its breath and time stood still for the slightest shift in the wind. Her father had died five months before Clarke turned eighteen, packed her bags, and thought she’d never look back. It wasn’t in the plan to ditch Yale and travel abroad during the semester, which is why Clarke never told her mother what she'd done. For all Abby knew, Clarke had spent the year on sprawling quad lawns, nose tucked behind detailed diagrams of the human anatomy to handle her grief. Not having a cold-eyed affair with a cobblestone countess named Lexa in Barcelona or painting the same street corner in Paris every early morning like it was a _sickness_.

Clarke’s fingers curled into a fist. “You have no idea what I’ve been through.”

Wells nodded, breathed out. “But you came back.”

Clarke narrowed her eyes, frowned. “Not for you. Not for any of this. And not for long.” With that, she shoved past him, took the grand staircase two steps at a time, pretty white socks rolling down around her ankles, her baby blue polo coming loose from its tuck.

“Clarke,” Abby called from one of their multitude of lost rooms, “did you see that Wells came by for you?”

“I saw,” Clarke muttered back. The door slammed shut behind her.

The world had fallen asleep to the quiet hum of crickets and the tick of the traffic light switching every minute or so. Their little manor was in the outer parts of Miston, far enough to avoid the midnight haze of a tired small town, rambling nomads on the street corners of their square, the coffee shop a haven for drowsy insomniacs.

Clarke waved a bit at one of their maids, who was tidying up the wrap-around porch. She found her old bicycle around back, ivy clinging to its wheels for dear life, a little basket still carrying an abandoned sketchbook at the bottom. She didn’t need to open it to know what was drawn inside. She jerked the wheels to life with a gentle roll and brushed the dirt away from the handlebars.

The road was as bumpy as ever. Summer had just started, and these paths weren’t worn away from their orchard workers yet. Clarke rode blindly, her skin growing sweet and sticky from the air, the ghosts on her back fisting the fabric of her shirt to follow along. There were parts of the land still bare from the fire, parts of it so burned through that nothing there would ever grow again.

She picked up speed.

It was then that the unworn road betrayed her, a loose rock sending her bike on a sharp left turn down the path to the abandoned barn, slanted and wobbly. Clarke gasped, tried for the brakes as one red wall came closer and closer. Her eyes darted open.

A hand came down over hers on the handlebar, halted her to a sharp stop.

“Easy,” someone rasped in the dark. Clarke still had her eyes closed, breathing hard. “You have a death wish?”

Clarke pursed her lips, tried to regain a bit of her sanity. When she opened her eyes again, she realized that there was more than just one person in front of her. She blinked at the sea of buzzed teenagers, beers in hand, conversation fading into curiosity. Leather jackets and bare midriffs, heads tilted back against the rickety wall. And at the head of it was none other than Bellamy Blake.

“She descends from her tower,” Bellamy said, low enough so that only she could hear. His rough hand slid across hers on the handlebar before dropping away. Her memory grasped for snippets of the man, young amber eyes in sunlight, a game of tag or two, fresh bruises and a quick tongue admired and giggled at from afar. But standing before her now was all dead flame. If burning was a boy, it’d be Bellamy Blake.

Clarke frowned. “This is private property.” She recoiled at the airiness of her voice, her ancestry laced like a ribbon around her vocal chords.

Bellamy watched her for a moment, then retreated back. “Now, I don’t know much about big business. But last time I checked, peach pickers can’t work from home.”

Behind him, Raven chuckled a bit.

“You’re trespassing,” Clarke said.

“Or wandering?” Jasper tried, then desperately attempted to stub out the joint in his hand.

Clarke wheeled forward a bit with silent bravado, head to head with Bellamy. “You’re here at ten-thirty to pick up peaches?”

Bellamy smiled, more amused than he’d been in a long time. He raised his beer and said, “Come on, princess. What kind of guy do you think I am? I thought I’d buy them a drink first.”

Bellamy drew laughter like mist did to rain. He was charismatic without trying to be, something Clarke couldn’t relate to. In this thick summer heat, she was still dead and cold. Over Bellamy’s shoulder, she spotted some yellow caution tape half dug into some gravel. When he saw her focusing on it, he turned to spy it in the dark, frowned back at her.

A pause.

Still watching Clarke, Bellamy called behind him, “Go home. Party's over.”

Neither was willing to break eye contact until Bellamy nodded at her, then gestured to her bike. “Should get that fixed unless you’re interested in ghost riding.”

Clarke rolled her shoulders back. “Thanks for the tip.”

She didn’t watch them go, just bent down by the old piece of caution tape and yanked it out from where it was wedged as the footsteps quieted and the chatter slowed. Clarke tucked it in the pocket of her skirt, crumpled it in her fist. It was only then that she realized there was a straggler still watching behind her.

“Hey,” Octavia called, some moonlight catching on her black waterfall of a mane, her animated eyes. A plaid shirt was tied around her hips, high-waisted shorts stopping just short of her bejeweled belly button. The pendant was a moon.

Clarke blinked at her. “Yeah?”

“Thanks for not being a bitch about this, running back to Mommy, or any of that,” Octavia said, not jeering, just honest. “Bellamy’s tough, but he’s soft inside. Rebel with a cause, you know? Just ignore him.”

Clarke offered her a little smile, fading as soon as it appeared. “Sure.”

Octavia nodded, then turned to go. But she turned to look at Clarke one last time. “Hey,” she said again.

Clarke waited.

“I’m sorry about your dad,” Octavia whispered to the night. She sounded burdened but bright, like she’d come to memorize loss as well.

“Yeah,” Clarke said. “Me too.”

:::

The next morning, Clarke watched the trucks roll in with a cup of tea in her lap, legs hanging out the window like her mother _hated_. A glint of light caught her eye from the side of the house, and she wrapped a white sweater around herself to escape into the dewy morning chill, the only bit of cold they were getting this month.

It was her bicycle: wheels pumped, bars polished, gears tightened brand new. The sketchbook inside of its basket was bent back a little, like someone had cracked it open to peek inside then left it alone.

Down the orchard, Bellamy folded down the piece of paper in his pocket, glanced at the distance as Clarke sat atop the seat of her bike in slight wonderment.

He cleared his throat, a silent hello to summer.

“Alright,” he called, “let’s get to work.”


	2. A Million Years Ago

> " _I know I’m not the only one_
> 
> _Who regrets the things they’ve done._
> 
> _Sometimes I feel it’s only me_
> 
> _Who can stand the reflection that they see."_

If this were some sort of storybook, Miston would have come to life upon Clarke’s arrival, tulip buds shaking awake and giggling at the brush of her fingertips, houses leaning in pink and pale purples like ladies in their Sunday finest, sharing gossip over tea. _But this was no storybook_. Clarke Griffin was just a burnt girl in a burning town; no lore left for the living.

The air was stiff and hot as she rode her bike down to the center of town, crooked houses, wicker chairs, and dry patches of grass peeking out from every corner.

 _Dorothy, is that you?_ The patches formed a circular strip: long buildings and pastel awnings, overgrown grass and black gates.  _There’s no place like home_.

Her destination – this cozy coffee place called The Ground – was the hustle and bustle of town this morning, if you could even call it that. Clarke regarded the little shop for a moment, its green roof and outer walls, potted plants sprouting from every surface imaginable, and pressed flower tabletops, before parking her bike and taking a brave breath.

A few folks she’d known as a little kid gave her lazy, smiling hellos. But others passed her by like she was something worse than a stranger.

The line was near out the door when she got in – workers with paint on their chins and moms carrying a baby on one hip and that month’s book club pick in the opposite hand. Clarke waited. That was all she seemed to be doing these days.

“Get _out_ of the line, Miss Griffin.”

Clarke stiffened at the hostility in the person’s voice behind her. It was a _snarl_ , angry and mean. But when she turned – along with a few other curious customers – she found Lincoln Ground standing before her, smiling proudly at his little trick, the _gentlest_ giant in the world.

“Because,” Lincoln said kindly now, raising a pretty clover coffee mug, “I’ve got your coffee right here.”

Clarke swore she exhaled frost when she saw her old friend, loosened and half-smiled as she crept toward him. Guarded, still. But that was the best she could do. There was a collective huff when she stepped out of the line and grasped the mug from Lincoln’s flour-coated, calloused hands.

“Hero,” she greeted against the rim.

Lincoln grinned, jostled her shoulder and gestured over to the little fenced seating area out back, bramble weeds sprouting over wood, flower buds crushed sickly sweet.

Clarke followed him to it, warm coffee spilling like bitter honey onto her fingertips, and raised her eyebrows in greeting when she saw Indra, Lincoln’s aunt and part-time warden rolling dough ferociously across the green counter, humming some old Southern tune under her breath.

“Hi, Miss Indra.” It’s what she’d been calling the woman since she was a little girl, back when Clarke and Lincoln were the oddest pair of best friends to behold, the former all brisk and cold and perfunctory, the latter all joyous and open and exuberant. They’d spend hours walking the groves and perimeter of the lake, always came back with ruddy knees and paint-soaked fingertips to eat one of Indra’s famous pies.

They were _best_ friends – made of the same paintbrush bristle bones and charcoal hearts – dark and _starving_. Some things just didn’t need any explanation.

Clarke paused when the woman didn’t react to her, then repeated, “Hi, Miss Indra.”

The woman, slanted in the face and warm in the eyes, set them dead on Clarke. Indra gave her a once-over – long, hard, and _scalding_ – then went back to her rolling, slower this time. She murmured, “Hm.”

Clarke released an exasperated breath. “I just got back into town.”

Another roll, another roll. “Hm.”

It was enough to send Clarke on her damn way. Outside, she cast a glance at Lincoln and plopped down beside him on a wicker chair, nursing her coffee even though it was already hitting lukewarm. She snorted, “Why’s your aunt in such a good mood today?”

Lincoln didn’t look at her. “Clarke.”

Annoyed at the scold in his tone, Clarke edged closer to him in the little space he left beside his broad, inked arms, the clover green apron slung in the crook of them. Her eyes searched his, then relented. “What? I knew that she was indifferent towards us being friends, but that was downright hostile.”

Lincoln exhaled, arms stretched behind him. His eyes were kind – they were always kind – but his tone was tired. “I guess she has an issue with people who abandon their roots.”

Clarke furrowed her brow as steam rose to kiss her on the lips. The mugginess outside wrought memories she didn’t want: the prickle of dead weeds against her bare shins, hanging upside down above the reservoir until the blood rushed to her head, her father’s voice calling her back home.

 _Her father’s voice._ Like the bang of an explosion. Like the whimper of smoke.

Clarke choked on the bit of steam and sputtered out into her coffee mug, which went skidding across the table. Lincoln caught it in one hand, seeming to regret the quiet jab.

She paused, wiped the edge of her lips with the back of her hand. “That’s what you think of me?”

Lincoln sighed. “No,” he said gently, but his voice seemed to weigh more than just that word. “No.” He repeated it firmly, like he was trying to convince both of them of it. After a few heartbeats, he reached behind him and sifted through a clutter of easels and canvases splattered with dry paint, a couple of notebooks tattered up at the edges, and a stack of pages curling up with dried watercolors. He offered one of them to Clarke. It was a portrait of her father.

The tears slipped down her cheeks of their own accord, and she’d have been furious with herself if it was anyone but Lincoln in front of her. If it had been because of anything but the spirit of her father staring back at her, immortalized by soft brush strokes, charcoal, and faded pencil lines. Jake Griffin’s face was drawn as accurately as a photograph would have captured him, but his features seemed surreal in the places they were interwoven with peach groves, leaves prickling his hair, the color of tree bark matching the shadows beneath his jaw. Clarke stared down at it for a long time, her body curling into itself, physical pain threatening to shatter her like glass until Lincoln’s hand hoisted her up and pulled her into his chest. She breathed him in: cookie dough and sugar, paint and wood chips.

Lincoln whispered against her hair, “You’re so intense, Clarke Griffin. You’re going to die if you don’t stop to breathe for two seconds.” He held Clarke at arm’s length, shook her shoulders until she squared them and wiped her tears. “Nothing’s going to hurt you here. Not if you don’t let it.” Lincoln smiled, nudged her. “Not if it doesn’t want to hurt your friend first.”

Clarke forced a smile. “Thank you.”

Lincoln nodded.

For a moment, Clarke thought about offering him one of the billion sketches she’d drawn of them both when she’d been out wandering the world and drowning in rebellion during their year apart, renditions of them drawing by the lake – portraits within portraits – intermixed with ones of herself and her mother, and her father, and _Wells_. But those always ended up torn through with the point of her pencil, Wells’ face drowned out by flame. She thought better of it, decided to change the subject.

“So, you’re painting again,” Clarke said, eyebrows raised. “How about those links I sent you?”

“From Greece or Germany…or was it Prague? Couldn’t keep up,” Lincoln shot back pointedly with an amused little smile.

Years ago, he’d gone to and graduated from Miston’s local college and gotten a degree in business, fulfilling the expectation that he’d work at The Ground – his mother’s legacy and now his aunt’s – until he’d eventually run it. But Clarke, whose expertise had always been throwing stones from glass houses, wanted a lot more for him, just as Lincoln wanted more for her. When she’d been gone, she’d sent him links for prestigious art schools across America, and he’d sent them right back to her, the subject line always a smiley face.

Couldn’t say they didn’t have anything in common.

“Fine,” Clarke remarked, rolling her eyes and carefully tucking the sketch into her bag. “Guess I’ll be seeing a lot of you this summer.”

Lincoln smirked. “Someone’s got to keep an eye on you.”

:::

Bellamy’s glare was even as he watched Clarke disentangle herself from the guy who worked at The Ground through the storefront's window, carefully regarding one of the rare and only smiles he’d seen grace her lips in a long time. It was only when the sunlight shifted and he caught his own reflection in the window that he scowled and backed away, realized he’d been standing there like an idiot for a solid ten minutes, on display for the entire goddamn town. _Jesus Christ,_ why the fuck did he care what Clarke Griffin did or didn’t do?

He was still frowning and muttering under his breath when he ducked into the shop and dropped a five dollar bill on the counter, eyes unfocused until an angry pair of hands clapped him back into consciousness.

“You want the pie in your mouth or on your face? Decide,” Indra snapped.

Bellamy frowned at her. “Stellar customer service.”

Indra cocked her head to one side, deadpanned him. “Need me to hold your hand while you order?”

He exhaled through his nose, half-smiled. “Coffee. Black.”

A minute passed before the woman tossed him the cup unceremoniously, along with his change.

“Nice talking to you too,” Bellamy called out over his shoulder as he blew on the coffee and stuck the bills in his back pocket.

When she was sure he wouldn’t see, Indra went back to rolling dough and smiled.

Outside, the clammy-handed heat clung to every inch of him, only made worse by the coffee on his tongue. Octavia and the others called him crazy for drinking hot coffee on hotter days, but it was a habit he’d picked up from Kane. If you got both at the right temperature, it soothed your insides in all the right ways. Like saying _fuck it_ and smoking a cigarette in a forest fire. Couldn’t even feel the heat.

Metal struck his arm and shook the cup, coffee spilling all over the front of his shirt. _But he felt that._

“Watch it,” Bellamy spat at the bike rider, scanning his arm for the mark their handlebar had left on his elbow. When he glanced up, he realized that it was none other than Clarke Griffin glancing back at him, wide-eyed and frowning. For a moment, he went speechless, eyes on the skirt of her dress, fanned out around her legs and the gears of her bike, the soft ruffles collecting around her collarbone. His gaze snapped up, he recovered. “A repeat offender.”

Clarke shot him a look but slowed to a stop, gripping the bars to walk her bike instead. “If I’m a menace on the road,” she said, “you’re responsible.”

Bellamy cleared his throat and kept walking. “Don’t know what you’re talking about.”

Clarke set her eyes on a random point in the distance as she walked beside him. “Oh, _please_.”

Bellamy didn’t answer.

Clarke scoffed. “Fine.”

They walked in silence back in the direction of the Griffin Estate, a Picasso row of colorful houses and slanted rooftops blurring into one abstract mess of a suburb. Clarke fumed at his apathy while Bellamy scrambled for something clever to respond. His humor went weak. Jokes always seemed to be trash when he was around Clarke. _Fuck._

Bellamy side-eyed her and tapped the side of her bike with his knuckles. “Shouldn’t you be collecting accident insurance on this thing?” But the moment he cracked the joke, he wanted to slap himself. The line wrought a memory that wasn’t safe to relive when he was around Clarke. Behind the cobwebs of his conscience, Abby Griffin’s face stared back at him lit by fire.

_“This is because of you.” Pieces of house were falling, shutters and branches tumbling down like an avalanche of flame. “This is all because of you.”_

Clarke mistook his silence for smugness. “Does it bother you?”

Bellamy raised a brow, forced himself to recover. “What?”

Clarke halted and cocked her head to one side, eyes narrowed, hip against her bike. “That chip on your shoulder.”

He smiled then, turned to look at her, then walked backwards while he dragged his coffee-stained shirt off his chest, yanking it over his head to tuck it in the back of his jeans and trade it for the pale uniform v-neck he had hanging from his back pocket. A picture of a peach and her own last name was embroidered on it.

“Funny,” Bellamy feigned, “I don’t see anything.”

Clarke narrowed her eyes when her skin heated and walked her bike forward more furiously, shooting past him as he chuckled. But they both halted to a stop when they spied a figure at Clarke’s front door, Wells Jaha carrying nothing but a bouquet of white lilies and a sad boy’s hunch.

Bellamy jostled her side with his arm. “That your boyfriend, princess?”

“You know that he’s not.”

Bellamy turned to her and suddenly donned an exaggerated accent as he strolled past the house and nodded at both Clarke and Wells. “Well, ma’am, I don’t know much of anything.” He stretched his arms and picked up a stray crate before heading towards the orchard down below. “Except how to pick _damn_ good peaches.”

Clarke was still glaring at him when Wells carefully strolled over to her, extending the flowers before coming any closer. She reached her arm out like she might take the bouquet, but her eyes were still on Bellamy in the fields, watching as he ambled down a hill and flicked the back of John Murphy’s neck when he caught the boy pocketing some peaches.

“Clarke?”

Her finger fell from the petal of one of the lilies. She smiled briefly at them, then avoided Wells’ eyes as she pursed her lips.

“Go home, Wells,” Clarke whispered to the grass before pushing the flowers back towards him. She inhaled like she wanted to say something more, then hopped up the steps to her front door. Without looking at him, she added, “ _Please_.”

Wells nearly cursed, flowers hanging by his thigh as the front door slammed. He wiped the nervous sweat from his forehead and bit his lip, almost considered knocking again. Instead, he set the bouquet down on one of the steps and straightened the collar of his polo before he headed down the path Bellamy had just gone, making a beeline to the tree he was half hidden behind.

“Bellamy.”

Bellamy’s hair fell into his face, the muscles of his arms flexing as he hopped down from a branch and swatted some dirt and peach juice from his cheek. He seemed genuinely surprised to find Wells staring back.

But before he could respond, a few of the kids pounced on the opportunity from down the row of trees.

Raven slung an elbow against a branch, cupping her mouth with both hands like a makeshift megaphone when she yelled, “ _Ow ow_ , first the princess, now our _prince_ slumming it in the trees. To what do we owe this honor?” Harper and Echo curtsied lazily beside her. But Raven’s smirk held more resentment than it did humor as she lugged a crate onto her shoulder, ponytail flipping and shorts ripped in a way that kept Wells staring, a little slack-jawed.

“I…I…”

Raven smiled, turned the other direction.

Behind her, Jasper was trailing Octavia like a puppy dog, holding an oddly-shaped peach in one hand and a lighter in the other. “No, I swear, you really _can_ smoke it out of a peach, too.”

Octavia finally stopped and sighed, hand on one hip. She batted her lashes, feigned interest. “Yeah? Let me see.”

When Jasper raised the peach, Octavia smashed it into his cheek, laughing when fuzz and chunks dribbled down the side of his face and into his shirt.

Bellamy cursed under his breath and held a finger up at Wells to wait. He stomped over to Jasper and snatched the lighter from his hand, slipped it into his own pocket. Octavia made a face when he pointed her over to the opposite end of the acres.

“Let me remind you that we’re all working with incentive this summer,” Bellamy rasped loudly enough to wake a dozing Monty, whose Nintendo DS slipped from his hands. “Yours? The pay. Mine? A lighter staff. This isn’t a daycare center. So please.” Bellamy made a tired face. “Grow up.”

Wells smiled when Bellamy rejoined him. “That must – ”

“I assume you’ve come to preach your woes to someone who you think cares,” Bellamy cut him off with a terse stare, jerked his chin at the Griffin house. “That secret-keeping working out for you?”

Wells frowned. “ _Hey_ , we’re protecting each other with that secret.”

Bellamy glanced over his shoulder to make sure that none of the delinquents were lurking nearby, the weight of that summer, of what they’d done, looming like the fire was still burning. “Yeah,” he snorted. “I feel real safe from behind the windows of my mansion.” He paused. “Oh _wait_. That’s you.”

Wells nodded at the ground, stood in silence for a moment. “We’re protecting Clarke.”

Bellamy said nothing to this, just pursed his lips and backed away from Wells, left him standing underneath the tree.

In the distance, Wells heard an added layer of venom in Bellamy’s tone when he confiscated a cell phone from Monroe. “You want to look for a new job with this, too?”

And that was that.

:::

Clarke’s tears fell like rain on her back porch steps, and the crickets stopped their song to lick them up. She watched them, forehead on her knee as daylight threatened to fade above her. She traced names and shapes with the tip of her finger on the wood beneath her, catching and cutting skin on a few spots as her chest heaved. It had been a mistake, coming back here.

It had been a mistake to ever leave.

“A modern _tragedy_ ,” Murphy drawled, appearing from the hill, shadows dancing across his angular features in a spooky way. He stood over her, and Clarke tensed and straightened, slapping the wetness from her cheeks. “Did Mommy buy you _two_ new iPhones instead of three?”

Clarke frowned and stood to look him in the eye. “You have no idea what you’re talking about.”

“He never does,” Raven called from behind them both, shooing Murphy away with the flick of her wrist and a cutting glare. “Go paint your nails black or something, doom and gloom.”

Murphy backed away with his hands up in surrender, like he couldn’t be bothered to engage in a snarky back and forth. He pasted on a fake smile. “You want to do it for me, Reyes?”

Raven flipped him off. Finally, she turned back to Clarke. “Look, normally I wouldn’t care, but what’s up yours?”

Clarke said nothing, trained her eyes on one of the trees.

Raven let out a harsh breath through her nose, raised her hands as Murphy had. “What? Now you don’t have anything to say? Guess that’s what you get for being nice to royalty.”

“Sorry,” Clarke finally rasped in response. Her throat tightened, her fists balled, more tears sprung to her eyes. She thought of Lincoln’s hesitance, of her father’s portrait, of Wells’ eyes, ones she used to draw for hours. Of coming home and realizing that she didn’t recognize it anymore. Leaves rustled away, paint chipped from the porch railing, and a few flowers wilted by a rocking chair. _Worse_ , it didn’t recognize her.

“Sorry,” she repeated, “I just…”

Raven nodded like she understood anyway. “Want some really shitty beer?”

Clarke let out a breath. “Yeah, I do.”

Ten minutes later, they were seated side by side on the ricketiest stools of the seediest bar in town. Polis was a steel shack on the backside of Miston’s heart, glowing red and grumbling old gravelly rock tunes to passersby like a grumpy elder on their porch. The walls were a sketchy mosaic of stolen road signs, carved initials of the ghosts of lovers and fuck buddies past, and posters vandalized with Sharpie, penis shapes, and a handful of vulgar phrases. Elvis hummed to his patrons from a half-broken speaker; the squeak and shimmy of leather and short skirts sang their own song back from the square inch of the joint’s dance floor.

The barista, Anya, was looking at Raven and Clarke like she couldn’t fucking believe it.

“Twenty-one my ass.”

Raven batted her lashes. “C’mon. I used to babysit your kid.”

Anya scowled. “Exactly.”

“Two beers,” Raven bargained, “and we’re both out of here. It’s been a really _long_ fucking day.”

Anya narrowed her eyes, looked at Clarke for a second longer, then relented and slid two bottles onto the counter. “I’m going on my smoke break. When I come back, you two are gone.”

Raven smiled.

They were silent as they drank, two girls with demons crawling up their skin. Raven only broke the calm when some beer spilled on her sleeve. She was still wearing her uniform from the orchard, and Clarke pretended it didn’t make her uncomfortable to see her own last name branded on the girl’s arm.

“Don’t fire me,” Raven said, a sarcastic edge to her tone. She ordered them a few more rounds from one of the new bartenders who’d been make eyes at her from across the bar when she was sure that Anya wouldn’t see.

Clark guzzled more of her drink. “Ha.”

Raven went to wipe her shirt, and a few books spilled from her duffel bag. One was a study guide for her GED. Another was a textbook on mechanical engineering. Both looked well-read, bookmarked with receipts and post-it notes. Clarke raised a brow.

“Yeah, I’m smart.”

“I wasn’t saying that you weren’t.”

“Well,” Raven said against the bottle’s rim. “I am. I’m the fixer. I fix shit, I fix people.” Her brow crinkled in a frown, but she was still smiling. “Only thing I haven’t figured out is how to fix myself.”

 _Another round, another round._ Clarke toasted to that.

:::

“ _Good_ night, Miston. It’s your favorite fucking pariah.”

Bellamy’s head snapped up as he changed out of his uniform shirt and into his battered white tee and leather jacket, a peach-stained paperback tucked under his chin. It dropped into his hands as he squinted into the fading light, gaze searching for the source of the ruckus before it caught on tumbling blonde waves and pale scabbed limbs beneath a pretty little dress.

“Jesus fucking Christ.”

“That’s right. You have no idea who – _mmph_ ,” Clarke’s eyes widened as she struggled against the hand over her mouth, calloused and rough against her lips. When she looked up through her drunken haze, Bellamy was frowning back at her.

“You’re buzzed.”

Clark swatted his hand away. “I’m _drunk_.”

Bellamy smirked, crossing his arms when he was sure that she’d lowered her voice. “I was being generous.”

“Well, don’t.” A southern twang slipped through her words like a tied ribbon, and Bellamy struggled to keep the smile on his lips at bay.

“Mom know?” Bellamy gave her a once-over, eyes flitting over to the pastel panels and pretty acre behind them. Windless, the grass slept quietly. But a firefly or two had come dancing down to their part of the yard, curious at the debacle.

“My mom,” Clarke said pointedly, loudly, “doesn’t know anything. Like the fact that I didn’t go to Yale. Or that I was fucking a girl.”

“Jesus,” Bellamy murmured under a ragged breath, shoving her out of sight when a shadow passed behind one of the manor windows. It was ironic. Clarke Griffin brought out the broken religion in him. “You want a confessional? Go to church.”

Clarke cut him a dirty look before pressing her lips to the back of her palm, stumbling back against a leaning tree. It was like tearing paper or lace – the slow rip through prim and proper.

She tied her hair back, a few blonde strands falling wild in her face.

_Maybe there had never been any prim in her proper._

“I’m fine,” she said, embarrassment the one true trick to sobriety.

Bellamy smiled. “Yeah?” When she didn’t answer, he thought for a moment before jerking his chin at the winding path, a bramble labyrinth in the opposite direction of where they’d come. A few trees leaned in like they were trying to hide it – crates stacked up to stand guard. “Come on.”

Clarke made a face. “So you can murder me?”

Bellamy stretched his arms out, shirt riding up his waist. “Spoiler alert.”

They walked in silence after that, Clarke trudging her black boots through pebbles and prickling weeds while Bellamy hummed something raspy under his breath, the paperback in the waistband of his jeans rustling paper against skin like they were one in the same.

Clarke pretended not to look.

When they got to where they were going, Bellamy reached his hand out to help her over the last slope of grass and rough rocks. Clarke walked past it and ambled over it herself, letting out a small breath and wiping her hands on her skirt when she finally sat down on the part of the knoll that overlooked the lake beyond it. Across the water, willow trees leaned over, leaves admiring their own reflections. Hoping to have a drink, maybe. Above them, the sky was orange and pink, a feverish day burning into night, stars itching to be seen. Clarke’s lips parted, the liquor in her belly warm. When Bellamy sat beside her, their arms brushed.

He smiled out at the lake. “You give Mayor Junior a good talking to earlier?” Clarke narrowed her eyes but didn’t respond, just knotted her hair up again. Bellamy watched one of the tendrils cling to her skin. He swallowed and nodded to himself. “This is the only place in town where you can see the sun setting so big. They call it – ”

“Sinner’s Row,” Clarke finished.

Bellamy nodded. “Light dies on everything bad you’ve ever done.”

“You’ve done a lot of bad things?”

Bellamy didn’t respond this time, just pulled up some grass and watched it fall through his fingertips.

“Yeah,” Clarke said, “me too.”

Night settled on them like an old friend, and the wind picked up, raised her gooseflesh and sent a chill up her spine. Clarke flinched when something hit her side, realized that she now had her hands on the rough leather of Bellamy’s jacket. She looked at him a moment, then shrugged it on.

“Careful, Bellamy. Someone might mistake you for a friend.”

Bellamy chuckled. “God forbid.”

Clarke searched his face for something. As cold as she wanted to be, there was always a hint of concern in her features, a silent whisper that she was just trying to figure everything out, do the right thing. That she was just a kid forced to become death’s friend.

She was a beautiful girl, she was a mirror. Both were dangerous things.

“We all think we’re doing everything for the right reason,” Bellamy said, shifting towards her on the grass. Drowsy from the drinking, her knee knocked into his and on a reflex, Bellamy held it there. Clarke exhaled and he grimaced, grip tightening.

_“I can’t do this.” A year ago, his voice breaking, the sickly smell of gasoline and wet grass. The light in Clarke’s window flickering off._

_“And yet it’s still on your hands.”_

Bellamy released Clarke’s knee, his thumb following the path of her burn mark like a constellation, a point on a map.

“Yeah,” she whispered, frowning as she pulled away. She was about to say something else until her eyes found an abandoned copy of that day’s paper, its headline rippling in the wind. They both tensed when she reached over him to snatch it up.

_PEACHES AND POLITICS. Abigail Griffin to run for Mayor of Miston against Mayor Jaha in upcoming election._

Bellamy frowned at the paper over her shoulder. “What the fuck?”

Clarke’s lips parted, her hands shook. “I didn’t know. She didn’t…”

“Yeah,” Bellamy huffed, swiping his palm over his face. “Exactly what this town needs.”

Clarke frowned. “ _Hey_.”

“I…” Bellamy looked like he might curse or punch or growl, something angry – something mean. Instead, he just grasped the back of his own neck and hung his head before pushing off of the grass. “I gotta go.”

That night, Bellamy left Clarke with her fingers curled into dirt and the newspaper weighing heavy on her lap. He found himself at Polis in a tangle of limbs and liquor, thinking he could burn the memories right through. And hours later, he was so drunk he could barely climb up the steps of Kane’s porch, fire in his eyes and embers on his back when he settled for sitting down on the plastic chair out front. All of the lights were off inside, and he’d rather have not gotten a sassy remark from Octavia or a fatherly lecture from Kane. The man had clearly been out there waiting up for Bellamy, had abandoned his novel and glass of whiskey on the little table beside him.

Bellamy finished off the glass and winced, splaying his fingers out across the page it was on.

_“My dear,_

_Find what you love and let it kill you._

_Let it drain you of your all. Let it cling onto your back and weigh you down into eventual nothingness._

_Let it kill you and let it devour your remains._

_For all things will kill you, both slowly and fastly, but it’s much better to be killed by a lover._

_~ Falsely yours”_

_**― Charles Bukowski** _

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *Thank you all for your patience while I put this on hold and published my first novel! The good news is that the period between updates won't ever be that long again - the next chapter is already a third done.  
> **And...I hope leather jacket Bellamy was worth the wait! As always, I'd love to hear your thoughts.

**Author's Note:**

> *Miston is a fictional Southern town invented by a city girl. Bear with me.  
> **This story is my all-time romantic brain child; I apologize for the sloppy kisses, slight infatuation, and firefly nights that are about to commence.


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